00:00And today, November 20th, is International Children's Day, or World Children's Day rather.
00:06The date marks the day the UN General Assembly adopted the Declaration of the Rights of the Child in 1959
00:12and the Convention on the Rights of the Child in 1989.
00:16Despite the good intentions of those measures, children continue to bear the brunt of war, deprivation of their rights and poverty.
00:23And joining me now is Cecile Aptel, Deputy Director of UNICEF's Global Office of Research and Forecasting.
00:30Good morning, Cecile, and thank you for joining us.
00:33On this World Children's Day, what are the biggest issues facing children worldwide?
00:41Good morning. There are many issues facing children, many issues impacting their rights,
00:48violations of the rights of children in conflict, as your report just has shown.
00:52But also, today, we have decided, as UNICEF, to bring the attention to a phenomenon that remains terrifying in terms of the impact on children, and that's poverty.
01:05We have in the world, in low- and middle-income countries, one in five children who live deprived of at least some of the essential services.
01:14We're speaking of nutrition, water, health, housing, sanitation, education, basic services that these children are lacking.
01:22One in five children in low- and middle-income countries, that's 470 million children worldwide.
01:30So we really want to demonstrate this as something that has a huge impact on children.
01:36But as you say, children are impacted in so many different other ways.
01:41Now, children are, by definition, dependent on their parents and guardians.
01:46So they invariably suffer knock-on effects of social and economic problems.
01:50Now, we all have children in our lives somewhere, whether it be our own children or relatives.
01:56So we definitely do feel a connection to children.
02:00But is it sometimes the case that even people who do have an affection for children can sometimes easily forget them,
02:08particularly those who are involved in policymaking and in government?
02:12That's the risk, which is that we feel that love and care for the children around us, but that's not necessarily reflected in policies.
02:24We see that when looking at policies that are effective to end child poverty.
02:31We know, in fact, what works.
02:33We know that to end child poverty, we can have access to essential public services, education, health care, again, water, sanitation, nutrition.
02:41That can be expanded through public services.
02:45But that means making the right political and budgetary decisions that put children and their families at the center of those decisions.
02:54We also know that social protection programs such as cash support for families are very effective.
03:01But there again, budgetary decisions, political decisions need to be in favor and supportive of those social protection programs.
03:09So to end child poverty, we need to make sure that ending child poverty is a national priority, that it is embedded.
03:18And that means people making those decisions.
03:20That's true at the national level.
03:22That's even also, of course, the case at the global level, where we need to have international political commitment to children's needs through the economic policies and budgets.
03:32And unfortunately, this is not necessarily very high in terms of the global policy discussions these days.
03:39Now, here in France, official figures show that 2.76 million children live in poverty.
03:45And that's an indication that even high-income countries have their problems.
03:50Are these countries better equipped than others to rectify the problems or are they also intractable?
03:57In fact, in those high-income countries, there's even more of a possibility to allocate budget towards policies that are supportive of providing essential public services to children,
04:12to invest into education, health care, to support social protection program, cash support for families.
04:19So high-income countries have more of the financial tools at their disposal to prioritize children's needs and to end child poverty.
04:30Indeed, in a country like France, we see 9% of children in France experiencing severe material and social deprivation.
04:37That's one out of 10.
04:39And that's very high for a high-income country.
04:41Now, there has been a lot of criticism in recent years of the effect of, for instance, social media or other technology on children.
04:51Is this something that UNICEF is taking seriously?
05:00We do take this very seriously.
05:02I mean, in fact, the life of children around the world, not only in high-income countries,
05:06is really taking place online as much as offline, and there's interaction between these two dimensions.
05:14So we do work extensively with children, with governments, but also with technology companies
05:20to see how we can both optimize the opportunities for children through online services and even artificial intelligence
05:30and minimize and even eradicate the risks.
05:33I'll give you the example of education.
05:35We really see that, you know, some schools around the world banning the use of phone,
05:42and we can see that as important in terms of protecting children's capacity to concentrate.
05:48But similarly, we also would not want to have a complete ban that would mean depriving children
05:53from tools that also give them access to information and education, and in particular in some deprived areas.
06:01So this is not such a clear-cut issue.
06:03We really need to have more data to know not only how long children spend online, but what they do online.
06:10And obviously, some of those activities can promote their well-being and their development,
06:15and other activities are extremely harmful.
06:17And we really need to boost the protection of children online as well, especially to ensure that they're kept safe.
06:23Now, we've spoken about some of the problems facing children worldwide.
06:28Can you point to any successful initiatives that have managed to alleviate suffering and problems for children?
06:37Sure. I will return to the question of child poverty.
06:43I mean, we've seen huge progress in terms of reducing child poverty.
06:47In fact, especially in the year from 2000 and for that decade,
06:53where we saw the rate of severe deprivation among children in low- and middle-income countries falling by a third.
06:59And that really means that globally, we went from three in five children living in poverty to two in five children.
07:06So that was a massive development.
07:09And I'm just going to point out to one specific country, Tanzania, for example,
07:13that achieved a 46 percent reduction in severe child deprivation between 2000 and 2023.
07:22Three, that was driven by government cash support grants to poor households,
07:27but also making sure that families could make their own decision on how to live, you know, to live themselves out of poverty.
07:36So, yes, there is really hope.
07:38We can, with the right decision, make sure that we eradicate child poverty.
07:43We can ensure that children's rights, including in conflict,
07:47are better respected by ensuring that those responsible for violations are held accountable.
07:53We have to really keep hopeful and keep fighting for children's rights
07:57and to give also their children a space for them to express their views and participate in decisions today that will impact their future.
08:07Now, young people, including children, have been to the fore of the fight against climate change,
08:14including Greta Thunberg, most famously.
08:17Is there a sense that children are possibly on the front line of suffering from the ravages of climate change?
08:29Unfortunately, yes.
08:31Children, because of their physical vulnerability, are far too often those severely impacted in case of heat waves, for instance.
08:42We know that especially babies, infants, have their body temperature more at risk of not regulating sufficiently quickly.
08:51We certainly see that in case of extreme weather events, we have children and especially younger children or children
08:58that may be living with disabilities very much at the forefront of those most impacted by this.
09:05So children are suffering in large part among those suffering the worst in those situations.
09:14They are also, as you rightly say, fighting for what they see as absolutely crucial in their future.
09:19We have been monitoring what we call eco-anxiety or climate anxiety among children and especially young people,
09:27and we find that concerning.
09:29We see a large number of children worldwide that are concerned with what is coming and what their future will be looking like,
09:36including because of the impact of climate change, but also more generally environmental degradation.
09:43So we see many children, you know, taking their place and asking for their right and their future to be guaranteed
09:50by decision makers and politicians making the right decisions today to preserve children's future.
09:57Thank you very much for that, Cecile Aptel, Deputy Director of UNICEF's Global Office of Research and Forecasting.
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